a bleeding purple utah jazz blog

More on Karl & John and the Utah Sports Hall of Fame

Karl Malone** To be back home, being here is just an awesome feeling, to be back where it started at. Even though we was at Salt Palace, I know it’s EnergySolution now, but I always say Delta Center. So it’s neat.

**Are you still working out? Every time I turn the TV on or go to some event, I see an athlete that motivate me…and I say, “I don’t wanna look like that.” Seriously. I’m not calling any name, but I was just at a football game with Texas A&M and Louisiana Tech played in Shreveport, and I saw an athlete who I look up to. And my son looked at me and said, “Dad, you’re not gonna look like…” and I said, “Absolutely not.”…

It’s just a way of life. Coach Sloan used to mess with me all the time. He said, “Boy, when you finish playing, you gonna, you have to, if I tell you to carry, you have to make two trips.” I can’t say the rest, ’cause Imma keep it clean now. But anyway, it’s just a way of life…If I don’t train now, I get very edgy after about a day and a half or two days.

**Can you still play 15 minutes a night? If my life depended on it, which it don’t, but if it did, I can give you a strong, I can play a little bit…but it’ll be a lot of fouls. And I’m gonna foul you hard, by the way.

**Memories of “glory days”: Well, the very first thing I think about is, no matter what anybody say, 12 other teams had me in for visits and said they was gonna take a chance, and they didn’t. And then the Jazz took a chance. So when I think about the glory days, I think about Frank Layden, Coach Sloan, Dave Checketts, the Miller family, took a chance on a little kid from Louisiana…and the Salt Palace, and my teammates…Adrian Dantley, who taught me how to be a professional. Take care of your body, ice…

So my glory days is Salt Palace, the Delta Center now which is EnergySolution and God bless ’em. My glory days was those time and the teammates like John Stockton, [Jeff] Hornacek, Bryon Russell, those guys, that’s what I remember. And and of course I haven’t talked about Jerry Sloan, who after that was stubborn enough to keep running the same plays for Stockton and I…

John Stockton**How far off are you from your playing weight? Same weight. My goal is not to change that. [Body fat still at 4 percent?] I like that body fat to be the same. I think I’m redistributing it, but I’m staying the same weight.

**Karl says he could probably still play 10-15 minutes a night. You? I’m pretty sure I couldn’t guard the speedy guys out front, but I’m also sure that Karl could. He has the strength and the size and the talent. There’s no question in my mind he could still get it done.

**On pickup games: I dominate play if I have better teammates than the other team. Then I’m OK. I can still pass it to the right guys and run up and down the floor a little bit. But I can’t guard any of my kids anymore, except for Samuel, who’s only 11. They can certainly guard me with pretty much ease, so it’s a frustrating turn of events. [Do you swat Samuel’s shot? Gotta show him who’s boss.] No, Sam has a wonderful personality and brings it out there. There’s no need to get physical–yet.

**Can you imagine Jerry Sloan getting back into coaching? Yeah, I can imagine him getting back into coaching. He’s been doing it a long time and he’s been one of the very, very best ever to do it in this whole game for a long time…If he wants back in, I think somebody would be delighted to have somebody of his quality that cares about important things that will steer your team in the right direction. I think they’d have a heck of a coach. [Do you think he still has that fire?] I do. The fire is hard to tell without looking him in the eye. We talk quite a bit by phone. I know he’ll make the choice that’s appropriate for him.

**On how Jerry influenced his career: We bond intellectually about the game. The things that are important to him were important to me, and the things he was able to teach me over the years not only helped me succeed, but helped our squad reach levels I don’t think people could have ever imagined around here. (KSL 5)